Ice Chess in balmy London and Moscow

1/11/2007 – With global temperatures climbing, and both Moscow and London experiencing warm spells, the "Ice Chess" match between the two cities turned into a race against time. Would the pieces, beautifully carved out of blocks of ice, melt away before the game, captained by Nigel Short in London and Anatoly Karpov in Moscow, could be completed? Here's the answer (with video!)

European Championship 2005 – the film

1/10/2007 – Feel like watching a 20-minute chess movie? Krzymowski Chess TV Production produced one, with great care and devotion, on the 2005 European Individual Chess Championship in Warsaw, Poland. It is heavy on classical music and contains interviews with well-known players.

Andrew Martin – across the spectrum

1/9/2007 – This week our ChessBase Radio Show draws its games from a wide range of tournaments, taking place in exotic locations all over the world: Hastings, Stockholm and Tehran. There is also a book review and an easy puzzle to solve. The show starts on Wednesday at 21:00h CET.

Peter Leko wins First ACP World Rapid Chess Cup

1/9/2007 – Rapid chess has its own special fascination. Players are more carefree, socialize with journalists and the public, comment on the games as they are being played. The atmosphere at the World Rapid Chess Cup in Odessa was congenial, and the games a pleasure to watch. Read about it in Misha Savinov's giant closing report.

Leko, Gelfand, Radjabov, Ivanchuk in semis of World Cup

1/8/2007 – If it wasn't for an incredible one-move blunder by Morozevich against Radjabov the top four seeds would have made it to the semifinals of the ACP World Cup. This way number five in the seeding list gets a chance. The rapid chess event is taking place in the splendid Londonskaya Hotel, and ends on Monday. Pictorial report.

Ice Chess match London-Moscow

1/8/2007 – This Thursday will see a special chess event on Trafalgar Square, London and Pushkin Square, Moscow. Two teams, headed by GMs Nigel Short and Anatoly Karpov, will play an Ice Chess match using a 64 square metre chess boards and pieces carved out of ice. Go watch – it is part of the Russian Winter Festival.

D.P. Singh – a supreme talent or a flawed genius?

1/8/2007 – Recently an Indian chess player was banned for ten years after he was caught receiving computer assistance during a game. A second player is under suspicion of having done similarly, after suddenly gaining 260 rating points in a short period of time. Top Indian grandmasters complained and the case is under investigation. Eyewitness report by Praful Zaveri.

A library on your computer - part five

1/8/2007 – When replaying games from a printed source on ChessBase's/Fritz' electronic chessboards, it's sometimes useful to add brief excerpts from an author's commentary to the games. We show you some useful (and time saving) shortcuts for achieving this in the latest ChessBase Workshop.

David Howell becomes a grandmaster at 16

1/6/2007 – Chess prodigy David Howell has broken Luke McShane's record to become the UK's youngest ever grandmaster. David made his final norm in Stockholm yesterday where he tied for second prize with 7/9 in the traditional Rilton Cup. His age: 16 years and one month. That puts him among the 20 all-time youngest GMs in the world. Picture report.

Merab Gagunashvili wins 82nd Hastings Congress

1/6/2007 – Has it really been that long? Indeed. The first Congress was held in 1895, it became a regular annual tradition in the 1920s, and the 2006/07 edition was the 82nd time it was staged. The winner was the top seed, 21-year-old Merab Gagunashvili of Georgia. An IM norms was scored by 12-year-old Srinath Narayanan of India. Report by Steve Giddens.

Iran emerges as a chess nation

1/5/2007 – Chess was invented in India, but transported to the rest of the world by the Persians. Before the 1979 revolution, Iran just had three International Masters who had the potential to achieve the grandmaster title. A ten-year ban of chess prevented them from reaching their goal. Now there are three GMs, and one in waiting. Big report on the Iranian Championships.

ACP World Cup: Kirsan speaks his mind

1/5/2007 – The opening of the First ACP World Rapid Chess Cup in Odessa, Ukarine, was a festive affair, highlighted by a frank press conference in which FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov answered questions of journalists. These were mainly about computer cables, cheating and a Kramnik-Topalov rematch. Read all about it in Misha Savinov's report.

Indian National Championship won by Surya Ganguly

1/5/2007 – Normally the championship of this chess superpower is a massive 22-player round robin event. This time it was staged as a 13-player Swiss with 45 participants. The venue was idyllic – the picturesque Atul Club in the State of Gujarat, 180 km north of Mumbai. The winner, who took his fourth Indian title, was Surya Sekhar Ganguly. Picture report.

Chess in the news

1/4/2007 – Is chess a sport, should it be included in the 2012 London Olympics? Is there a basis for thinking that cheating with computers is going on at the very highest level? What is the potential of the strongest Indian players according to Commonwealth champion Nigel Short? And why hasn't Tania Sachdev's face launched a thousand products yet? We've been reading the papers.

Learning from Lasker: the art of defence

1/4/2007 – Recently our Playchess lecturer Dennis Monokroussos stumbled across a game in which White committed an egregious error, but then hung on to the position with extraordinary tenacity, somehow thwarting Black's attacking efforts. The players: Emanuel Lasker vs Aron Nimzowitsch. The year: 1934. Come watch, with an attentive mind.

A New Year with chess trainer Andrew Martin

1/3/2007 – We start 2007 with an Andrew Martin Radio show directly from the ChessBase studio in Hamburg. Our chess trainer interviews Frederic Friedel for a second time – the first was sixteen years ago. After that there are games and a puzzle to discuss. The show starts at 15:30 GMT/16:30 CET on Wednesday, January 3rd. See you on the server.

Chess – and a new electronic chess system – in Bolivia

1/2/2007 – The game is popular in Bolivia, but not properly encouraged. The country has produced just one grandmaster, who is 200 Elo points above everyone else in the region. But now it can boast its own digital chess system, a clock and sensor board used to display games and broadcast them on the Internet. Hitech made in Bolivia.

Topalov still tops the list, Anand four points behind

1/2/2007 – The January 1st 2007 FIDE rating list has Topalov still at place one, in spite of losing 30 points from his match against Kramnik and the Essent tournament. The gap to Vishy Anand has reduced to just four points, with world champion Vladimir Kramnik in third, 17 points below the leader. Lists and statistics.

Sun nien fai lok – a Happy New Year

1/1/2007 – That's what we wish our Chinese friends and our English speaking readers. For the rest we have a list of many different languages. Please let us know if any is given wrongly or missing. And for New Year's day a monochromatic chess puzzle, the last of our Christmas set, by John Nunn. Have a happy and prosperous year.

A library on your computer - part four

1/1/2007 – Now that you have a newly created database, how do you get games into it? In the latest ChessBase Workshop we discuss copying games and inputting them from scratch, and show you how to do it in both ChessBase and Fritz.

Third Singapore International Chess Convention

12/31/2006 – At the end of every year, the biggest chess celebration in South-East Asia takes place in Singapore. It includes a Masters & Challengers tournament with a $18,000 prize fund. Players from 15 countries take part, with GMs, IMs, WGMs and may very young hopeful players. Big pictorial report by Olimpiu G. Urcan.

Jennifer Shahade on shaking up the chess world

12/29/2006 – "I have very mixed feelings about the various Anna Kournikovas of chess who promote chess and themselves in sexy modeling shoots," she says. "A big dream is to help get chess on TV or featured in a film so I’m also working on that with a few different producers, hoping that if I shoot enough darts we’ll hit a bull’s-eye one day." Read this indepth interview with the author of 'Chess Bitch'.

Astonishing Alexander Morozevich wins Pamplona

12/29/2006 – When he is good he is very, very good. The Russian grandmaster drew exactly two games in Category 7 tournament in Pamplona, winning all the rest of his encounters. His performance was 2951, and if he had won queen vs rook ending in one game his performance would have in fact been 3085! The draw rate in the event was only 35%. Results and highlights.

Will Kübra checkmate the volleyball star?

12/28/2006 – It would be a first in chess. 15-year-old Kübra Öztürk, Gold medal winner at the European U16 Championship, has been nominated for Sportsperson of the Year by the Turkish newspaper Milliyet – and is now in second place behind an international volleyball star. A few more votes and the chess hopeful will take first place. Voting ends on December 29.